Consonants

Finding the Consonants of Khuzdul

To determine Khuzdul's consonant inventory, I started by taking the existing corpus of Khuzdul words and listing all of
the consonants that could be identified in isolation. This was a fairly straightforward process, and yielded the following chart (listed in IPA for comparison to other languages).

Attested Khuzdul Consonants in IPA:

Labial

Alveolar

Post-Alveolar

Palatal

Velar / Uvular

Glottal

Stop

b

d , t
th

g , k
kh

ʔ

Fricative

f

z , s

ʃ

h

Trill

ʀ

Approximant

l

j

Nasal

m

n

Next, I decided to look at the consonants found in the related languages: Adunaic, Biblical Hebrew, Modern Hebrew, and Classical/Quranic Arabic. The comparison to Adunaic and Hebrew would probably be more important. Adunaic is the closest language to Khuzdul found in Middle-earth, and Tolkien stated that Khuzdul resembled Hebrew in its phonology. The charts shown are from The Treason of Isengard (for Adunaic) and Wikipedia (for Hebrew and Arabic). For Hebrew and Arabic, I also referenced the books I have, and for the sake of a rough comparison, the charts from Wikipedia are close enough.

Adunaic Consonants in IPA:

Labial

Alveolar

Post-Alveolar

Palatal

Velar / Uvular

Glottal

Stop / Affricate

b , p
ph

d , t
th

dʒ , tʃ

tʃh

g , k
kh

ʔ

Fricative

z , s

ç

ɣ x

h

Trill

r (?)

Approximant

w

l

j

Nasal

m

n

Biblical Hebrew Consonants in IPA:

Labial

Inter-Dental

Alveolar

Post-Alveolar

Palatal

Velar / Uvular

Pharyngeal

Glottal

Stop

b p

d t

tʕ

g k

kʕ

ʔ

Fricative

v f

ð θ

z s

sʕ

ʃ

ɣ x

ʕ ħ

h

Tap / Trill

r

Approximant

l

j

w

Nasal

m

n

Modern Hebrew Consonants in IPA:

Labial

Alveolar

Post-Alveolar

Palatal

Velar

Uvular

Pharyngeal

Glottal

Stop

b p

d t

g k

ʔ

Affricate

t͡s

dʒ tʃ

Fricative

v f

z s

ʒ ʃ

χ

ʕ ħ

h

Tap / Trill

Approximant

l

j

w

ʁ̞

Nasal

m

n

Classical/Quranic Arabic Consonants in IPA:

Labial

Inter-Dental

Dental / Alveolar

Lateral

Palatal

Velar / Uvular

Pharyngeal

Glottal

Stop

b

t d

tʕ

ɟ

k

kʕ

ʔ

Fricative

v

θ ððʕ

s z

sʕ

ɮ

ɕ

χʕ ʁʕ

ħ ʕ

h

Tap / Trill

ɾʕ

Approximant

l

j

w

Nasal

m

n

After doing this side by side comparison, some interesting things pop up:

1)
The existing examples of Khuzdul end up with the same set of labials
as Arabic. Often, LotR fans wonder if or assume that Khuzdul
will have / p /, but this shows that it is equally likely that it does
not.

2) The two aspirated consonants that Tolkien mentions in the books rergarding Khuzdul are / th kh /. There is no mention of / ph
/. It's noteworthy that these parallel the emphatics of both Hebrew
& Arabic, which are the velarized or pharyngealized consonants / tʕ kʕ / or / tʕ qʕ /.

Generally, though, you can tell from the comparison that Khuzdul is within the ballpark of Adunaic and Semitic languages.

Adunaic, Hebrew, and Arabic all had
more consonants than what is evidenced in Khuzdul. The question was
where to look and see if Khuzdul might have more. I decided that the logical
place to look was at their writing system, the Angerthas (runes).I went
to the table of the Angerthas runes in Appendix E of LotR to find
potential sounds and select which of those may or
may not be found in Khuzdul. . I figured that since the Dwarves wrote with those
letters, if they didn't have a rune for a given sound, it probably
didn't exist in Khuzdul. Sorting through all of the information
surrounding the Angerthas was a bit tricky though, since it was used
differently by the different races and for several different languages.
However, I combed through that information, which is mostly from LotR
Appendix E, Treason of Isengard, and Sauron Defeated. By comparing the sounds listed in the Angerthas with the consonant inventories of Adunaic, Hebrew, and Arabic, I was able to arrive at a list for Khuzdul that seems to make a lot of sense.

The sounds in bold blue
are the sounds that I added to the inventory based on the evidence.

Rationale for Added Consonants

Here are the reasons why I added each consonant to the inventory (using orthography):

p, ph:
I was a bit hesitant to add these. The attested consonants of Khuzdul ended
up matching its labial stops & fricatives with Arabic, which I
though was pretty nifty. However, Hebrew, several other Semitic languages, and Yiddish all have <p>, and Tolkien said that Khuzdul's phonetics resembled those of Hebrew. I was even more hesitant to add <ph> since even Biblical
Hebrew doesn't have an "emphatic [p]", which would be velarized or
pharyngealized. This would match the attested aspirates in
Khuzdul. However, Adunaic does have both <p> and <ph>.
Also, Appendix E in LotR says that aspirates were "common" in Khuzdul,
so it would seem odd to only have 2 in <th> and <kh>. The
Dwarves of the Lonely Mountain (Erebor) eventually added runes for the
consonant combinations <ps ts ks>, which were common in Quenya
(and maybe Sindarin?). Khuzdul already has <khs> (which is
<kh> + <s>). I figured if both Khuzdul and surrounding
Mannish languages of the Northmen had these, then it would have made
even more sense for the Dwarves to add them since their use of Quenya
would have been fairly limited as far as I can tell.

v: Since I added <p> on the basis that Hebrew and Adunaic had it, I went ahead and added this sound as well.

w:
Again, Hebrew and Adunaic have this sound, and so does Arabic.
It also adds another "weak consonant" (in addition to < ' y h >)
that will make for some irregular word forms. Khuzdul was noted as
complex, so this will add so that.

c j ch: This
combination might be controversial for those who have read about
Khuzdul a bit. In Appendix E, Tolkien states that "ch is only used to
represent the sound heard in bach (in German and Welsh), not that in English church."
However, when he says that, he is only referring to the orthography
used in the narratives; that is, in the stories. The <ch> found
on the table of Angerthas values actually represents [ tʃ ] in English church.
The Angerthas use a different transliteration scheme, which is
intended more to represent different sounds somewhat accurately, as
opposed to the start of Appendix E which is how those sounds are
presented to readers in the stories. I have started to call this
difference "Tolkien's Narrative Orthography" vs. "Tolkien's Phonetic
Orthography".

Adunaic had a "C-series" of consonants, which was apparently post-alveolar, palatal, or both. Like the
other series, it had a voiced, unvoiced, and unvoiced-aspirated trio of
stops. In Sauron's Defeat, they are described as "front or palatal
consonants orginally; that is roughly consonants of the K-series in the
extreme forward or y-position." It's hard to tell exactly what that means, but it sounds like they may have been palatalized [ kj gj kjh] or just palatal [c ɟ ch
]. I suspect the former, because Tolkien adopted the notation < c j
ch > "because their later development was to simple consonants". To
my understanding, [c ɟ] are often realized more as affricates. Tolkien
also uses the orthography <j>, which leads me to believe that his
"simple consonants" may actually be more in the line of [ç ʝ çh ], [ tɕ dʑ tɕh ], or [ tʃ dʒ tʃh
]. He often describes alveolars as "dental", which makes it seem like
he broke front-to-back locations into roughly front (dental/alveolar),
middle (post-alv. to palatal), and back (velar to glottal). There is
nothing I can find in the source material that describes a "hard palatal
C" [c], as opposed to an affricate.

Another thing that leads me to include <c j ch> is that both Biblical Hebrew and Classical Arabic have [ s z sʕ ] (according to my sources). It may be debatable whether [ sʕ
] is actually pharyngealized. The point is that they have an "emphatic
[s]". I didn't like that there was no good way for Khuzdul to have an
emphatic <s>, since the Khuzdul "emphatics" are apparently aspirates. I did
note that some scholars believe Biblical Hebrew's [ s z sʕ ] may have actually been [ts dz tsʕ]. That is just a step away from [ tʃ dʒ tʃʕ ]! So, because of that and that Adunaic has the series, I felt comfortable adding them.

The
Dwarves modified the cirth (rune) for <j> not once, but twice.
One of those instances was by the Dwarves of Moria when they were still
there. This is just one more indicator that the <j> sound may
have been in Khuzdul, as well as other languages with which they were in
contact.

One final note: adding this sound allows the name
Telchar to be a Khuzdul word, rather than a very stretched attempt to explain
it via Sindarin. This works well, because the two other Dwarves of the
1st Age that are named also have apparently Khuzdul names: Azaghâl and
Gamil Zirak. The assumption is that Dwarves didn't give out their
inner, Khuzdul names. To me, it seems obvious that these names are
probably outer names. In the 1st Age, there wouldn't have been as much
contact with Men yet, so the Dwarves may have used Khuzdul words as
outer names. Also, Khuzdul somehow influenced the languages of Men
(Adunaic), and I doubt that would have only been through a few
place-names. Instead, it seems far more likely that the Dwarves had
outer Khuzdul names that provided more samples to loan to Men.

zh:
Like <j> above, this cirth for this sound was modified twice by
the Dwarves. It doesn't appear in Biblical Hebrew, Arabic, or Adunaic, but
does show up in Modern Hebrew and Yiddish. However, Biblical Hebrew and Classical Arabic may
have had the laterals [ ɬ ] and [ ɮ ] respectively. Since Middle-earth
is a sort of prehistoric Earth, I could see Khuzdul's <zh>
shifting into those slots. This sound actually doesn't appear in any of
the languages of Middle-earth as they are described, so Khuzdul may
well have had it. The cirth for this sound was added by the Elves of
Eregion to represent sounds not found in Sindarin, so Khuzdul seems like
the likely candidate since there are no others.

hy:
This was added by the Dwarves of Moria, and it is also found in
Adunaic. Arabic and Hebrew have a bunch of fricatives in the velar to
glottal range. Having this sound strengthens Khuzdul's inventory in
that area, or at least right next door. See the comments below about <kh> and <gh>.

About the sounds that I have not included:

hw, lh, rh:
These are voiceless <w l r>. Hw appears in Westron, and I think
maybe the Elvish languages as well. The others were used by the Elves.
Hebrew, Arabic, and Adunaic do not have them, so it seems likely
that they come from the Elves, not Khuzdul.

mb, nj, ng, nd:
These are all a result of "nasal infixion", which is a process that
occurs in Quenya and Adunaic. In Sauron Defeated, Lowdham's Report says
that Khazadian (Khuzdul) does not have this feature at all. Therefore,
I have left them out as phonemes. That said, the Dwarves apparently
did use them to write simple consonant clusters, even though they would
probably cross syllable boundaries (given Semitic syllable structures).

th, dh, kh: These are the sounds "th" in "thin", dh as "th" in "there", and "kh" is the same as German's "ach-laut" found in "bach". Tolkien says in Appendix E that Khuzdul does not have these sounds. It's a bit surprising that Khuzdul doesn't have this <kh> sound (note that this <kh> is different than the <kh> seen in Khuzdul, which is an aspirated stop). Adunaic and Biblical Hebrew both have it, and Modern Hebrew and Arabic have the voiceless uvular fricative instead. The uvular fricatives don't show up in the Angerthas chart, so Khuzdul probably doesn't have that. My guess is that Tolkien was concerned with orthography (he seems to have been quite particular about how words look on the printed page) as he was already using <kh> for an aspirated stop. Using <ch> might have been an alternate route, just like in Sindarin, but as I mention above that is probably used for the aspirated post-alveolar affricate <ch> in English "church". This leaves Khuzdul empty in a range where all related languages have one or more sounds. I think this is where <hy> enters the picture (German's "ich-laut"). Like uvulars, palatals are right next to velars, and its presence in German may have reminded Tolkien of the Jews he was familiar with. They probably would have been Yiddish speakers, but even Yiddish doesn't have the <hy> sound; it has a voiceless uvular fricative like Modern Hebrew and Arabic. Still, they would have also commonly spoken German, so that may have made Tolkien feel comfortable in adding it.

gh: This is the voiced fricative paired with <kh> above. There is one Khuzdul name, Azaghâl, where this sound potentially shows up. However, in Appendix E, Tolkien notes that this sound is seen in Orcish and Black Speech, but there is no mention of Khuzdul, Westron, or Adunaic. I think that is telling. Also, I have found no vocalization in Hebrew or Arabic similar to Azaghâl, where a glottal stop is prefixed with a vowel and the first radical has a vowel as well. You can find 'aCCâC commonly in Arabic, but nothing like 'aCaCâC. The -âl could conceivably be the same as the adjectival suffix -ul seen elsewhere in Khuzdul, but Tolkien used a <u> or <û> everywhere else. Although Adunaic and Biblical Hebrew have this sound, Modern Hebrew and Yiddish do not. They only have a voiceless fricative in this range with no paired voiced fricative. From all of this, I can see Tolkien leaving this sound out of Khuzdul. It's not a clear call, but I lean in this direction.

kw, gw, khw, ghw, ngw, nw:
These are labialized consonants, and for the most part are found as
either phonemes in Quenya or consonant clusters in Sindarin. Hebrew, Arabic, and Adunaic do not have them at all. I can't picture
Khuzdul having them at all, either.

ps, ts, x (ks):
These are said to be common consonant clusters in Quenya and I think
Sindarin. Even there they are not phonemes. The Dwarves added these
runes, and I suspect they were found in Khuzdul, Adunaic, and other
languages of Men in addition to Quenya and Sindarin. Since the Dwarves
used the "nasal infixion" runes (above) for simple consonant clusters,
they probably found it useful to add these since they were common. They
were NOT added by the Dwarves of Moria, so I doubt they are considered
phonemes. They are consonant combinations, not affricates.

ŋ:
Hebrew, Arabic, and Adunaic all lack this sound, unless it's an
allophone of <n> when before a velar consonant. Sindarin and
Quenya have it, and it was said that where Adunaic differed from Quenya
was where it most resembled Khuzdul. Hence, Khuzdul doesn't get this
sound.

bh, dh, gh ("aspirated" voiced stops):
One of the common assumptions by linguistic novices (and myself at one
point!) is that because there are aspirated voiceless stops <th
kh> there must be voiced ones as well. Adunaic did not have these at
all. Biblical Hebrew and Arabic have the voiceless - voiced - "emphatic"
voiceless trio of stop. Like Adunaic, Khuzdul's "emphatics" are apparently aspirated
consonants, which gives it a 3-way distinction of voiceless - voiced -
aspirated voiceless, which is common in the world's languages. Also,
Tolkien routinely uses <gh> to represent [ɣ], a fricative, so that takes away the orthography for an "aspirated <g>". The only place that
even hints at "aspirated voiced stops" (which would actually be
"breathy voiced") is the word sharbhund. However, I decided to deal with this example by breaking it into the syllables sharb + hund.